


Edward Kaspbrak, MaS, MEcon. Returns To Work

by decinq



Series: Eddie Kaspbrak's Long List of Accolades, including Masters of Applied Statistics, Masters of Economics, Office Gossip Star and Gay Internet Icon [1]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Eddie Kaspbrak's Capitalist Blood Sucking Job, Gen, POV Outsider, Post-IT Chapter Two (2019)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-14
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-18 10:21:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28741662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/decinq/pseuds/decinq
Summary: Kaspbrak had interns four months of the year; Kaspbrak probably paid off his nine years worth of student loans with half a year’s salary; Kaspbrak wore suits that cost more than all the furniture in Laney’s apartment combined and ate the same salad for lunch each day.Laney had dropped out of Stern in her third year and lied about it on her resume. She worked in QA, which meant she sometimes audited Kaspbrak’s work, along with the work of a number of his lackeys, and only had reason to email him once or twice a quarter. She was obsessed with him.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Series: Eddie Kaspbrak's Long List of Accolades, including Masters of Applied Statistics, Masters of Economics, Office Gossip Star and Gay Internet Icon [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2107167
Comments: 55
Kudos: 476





	Edward Kaspbrak, MaS, MEcon. Returns To Work

Laney slid into the booth opposite Jack and immediately reached for Jack’s beer. 

“Hi, I need this more than you.”

“Okay,” Jack said, because she was really nice and supportive. Laney took a hefty pull of the beer, which was a lager which she usually hated, but honestly, at this point she would take anything. “I ordered fried pickles and potato skins.”

“You’re my wife,” Laney said when she surfaced from Jack’s pint glass. 

Jack smiled. “That I am. That bad?”

“Not even,” Laney said. “Or, well, yeah, but it’s just been. Bizarre. Busy.”

“Okay, okay, tell me.”

“I only have 45 minutes before I have to be back. We can talk about something else.”

“No way, dude.” Jack took her beer back and took a sip before putting it back into Laney’s hands. “I switched my shift with Jase ‘cause he has something early tomorrow, so I won’t be home until you’re already in bed. Spill.”

“Okay, so Kaspbrak is back.”

“First day back?”

Laney nodded. Jack knew all about Kaspbrak. He was Laney’s favourite coworker and the biggest thorn in her side today. She highly doubted she made his list of coworkers he knew the names of, but she liked him anyway. Jack called it hero-worship, which Laney would never accept out loud but in her heart knew it was at least a little bit true. It was like when you found out someone you knew was friends with a celebrity. Imagining all the scenarios in which you could become friends through sheer coincidence and force of will was a satisfying method of daydreaming. 

Edward Kaspbrak MAS, MEcon had been out of the office for six weeks after he didn’t call in sick one Friday near the end of August, which was something that was shocking to most of everyone, not just Laney. Turned out, he’d been in an accident. 

He was a surly guy, but smart as a whip and at the very least polite to Laney when they got caught at the Keurig in the second floor kitchenette together. Every single time they met there, he said, “You know, the big kitchen downstairs has a real coffee machine,” and Laney said, “People don’t know how to clean it properly. It’s a cesspool.” He always nodded, and always left the carton of oat milk out for her. Kaspbrak was several tiers of importance and command higher than Laney, as far as office food chains went, and their work rarely overlapped. Kaspbrak had interns four months of the year; Kaspbrak probably paid off his nine years' worth of student loans with half a year’s salary; Kaspbrak wore suits that cost more than all the furniture in Laney’s apartment combined and ate the same salad for lunch each day. He snipped at people in meetings and was almost always right. And even if he wasn’t always right, Laney thought he was probably never wrong. There was a distinct difference in her mind, but she could never explain it to Jack. 

Laney had dropped out of Stern in her third year and lied about it on her resume. She worked in QA, which meant she sometimes audited Kaspbrak’s work, along with the work of a number of his lackeys, and only had reason to email him once or twice a quarter. She was obsessed with him. 

“So, the rumour mill is just, you know, churning.”

“Do mills churn?”

“Irrelevant. Everyone’s going fucking insane - he’s been responding to emails from home for the last week, apparently, just absolutely shredding apart people’s work because they fucked one of his accounts, I guess. So half the office is like, shaking out of their skin because they’re afraid to face him again, and the other half cannot wait to see what the fuck he’s going to do next, since they assume they’re free from his wrath.”

A stupid assumption for anyone to make, ever, really. Laney cannot imagine the hubris you’d need to have to think you weren’t in the splash zone when you were in the same building as him. 

“So he strolls in just after nine, which is late for him - he used to always be in the office by 7:45 at the latest, and he usually stayed until after 6. And he’s got a fucking scar in the middle of his face, like, dead in the centre of his cheek.”

“Well, he was in an accident, right?”

“Right, but I don’t think that had anything to do with his face. He dislocated his shoulder and had to have some tendons repaired or something. Anyway, everyone is clearly whispering about him, but instead of saying anything, he just goes into his office. I didn’t see him when he first came in, but Alex, you remember Alex? Her desk is right by his office door, and apparently, he isn’t wearing his wedding ring. She saw.”

“Oh shit,” Jack said, drawing it out.

A server brought over their fried pickles and potato skins, no bacon, and Laney asked her for a cider, no ice.

“Yeah, so, then people just start making shit up; his wife hit him with his car; she stabbed him in the face; he left her and she went cuckoo bananas because he definitely has a prenup.” She looked at her phone. “And he’s only been back at work for like, three hours. People already think he’s been _stabbed_ . By his _wife!_ ”

“Straight people,” Jack said, rolling her eyes. 

“Yes, okay, so, Alex said he closed his door and whatever, but then he was just sitting at his desk doing work but listening to Death Cab for Cutie on his desktop Spotify app or whatever.”

  
  


“Is he okay?”

“Who fucking knows?” Laney said and shoved an entire fried pickle into her mouth. She immediately spat it back out, and Jack made a face.

“Too hot?”

“Too hot,” Laney nodded and sipped her cider. 

“Here,” Jack said, and sliced the remaining pickles in half. Little ribbons of steam rose from the middle. 

“Thanks,” Laney smiled at her. “So you switched your shift for Jason? He okay?”

“Ah, he’s fine, he has a dentist appointment at 8 am in Jersey, so I said I’d switch with him so he doesn’t need to take a cab.”

“Why is his dentist in Jersey?”

“His mom lives there or whatever, I don’t know.”

Before Laney knew it, they were done their food and she’d finished her cider. “I gotta get back,” she said. “I’ll miss you tonight.”

“I’ll miss you now,” Jack said, and Laney kissed the top of her head as she left. 

Alex had texted during lunch - she slid it open.

_You gotta get back here_

_LANEY!!!_

_SOS!_

_ELAINEEEEEEEEEE_

_What’s wrong?? I’m walking back now. 5 mins away??_

_Rich Tozier is here!!! In EK’s office???_

_Who?_

_God you’re literally too gay_

_You’re gay??_

_AND I’M HOMOPHOBIC AGAINST YOU! LISTEN!_ _  
_ _RICHIE TOZIER IS A CELEBRITY AND HE’S CURRENTLY_ _  
_ _SITTING IN KASP’S OFFICE WITH HIS FEET KICKED UP._

_K I googled him, he looks like gumby lol_

_I’m kinda into it - like…._ _  
_ _  
_ _I could fix him_

_Why is he meeting with EK?_

_IDK BUT TROY IN ACCOUNTING IS LOSING HIS SHIT_ _  
_ _APPARENTLY HE’S A BIG FAN OF HIS COMEDY_

_Gag. Troy is literally a homophobe. Alpha Gamma POS_ _  
_ _Anyway i’m in the elevator, be right there_

  
  
  


When Laney got out of the elevator, the vibes in the office were...very strange. Clearly, everyone in the office was talking about Kaspbrak and his face scar and his lack of ring and his new celebrity visitor (Kaspbrak didn’t take on individual clients, so this was particularly strange). But she liked him and didn’t want blood on her hands, so she crossed to her corner of the office without saying anything to anyone. 

Laney sat down at her desk and pulled up her Excel documents and ignored the Slack notifications from Alex for a solid twenty minutes - she usually worked through her lunch break so she could leave at four instead of five; she was working on acknowledging the cost of her labour. It was okay to take breaks that she was legally allotted. She was focused, so she didn’t think anything of it when someone cleared their throat behind her, but looked up when a voice said, “Uh, Elaine?”

She turned. Tugged her Airpod out of her ear. “Hi, sorry, I was in the zone,” she said.

The guy behind her desk smiled - he was tall, in glasses, and she recognized him from her very perfunctory Google search on the walk back. Rich Tozier. He was holding Kaspbrak’s coffee mug in his hand. 

“No worries, you’re working. I’m Richie,” he said and stuck out his free hand for her to shake. She shook it. She wasn’t raised by wolves. 

“Laney,” she said. “You do not need to call me Elaine. Only my GP and Grandmother call me that.”

“Sorry,” he said. “Uh, so, Eds said you’re the only person he trusts in the hell hole to make a cup of coffee. He just got a phone call, so I hope it’s not, uh, really shitty of me to ask you for help?”

It took everything in her to not raise her eyebrow at the nickname. Not a client, then. Huh. 

“Not shitty,” she said, although she was busy and she wasn’t an EA. To be fair, she didn’t think EA’s should be getting coffee for Execs either. And Rich Tozier was right - everyone else was fucking disgusting and left their rotting leftover lunches in the fridge for weeks on end. They could not be trusted. She grabbed her own mug off her desk. “I’ll show you.”

“Cool,” Rich Tozier said. She stood and walked to the kitchenette; she didn’t know what to say. It was kind of awkward. “So,” Rich Tozier said. “Your office is, uh, cool.”

“It is not cool,” she said and laughed. She studied the Keurig pods. “Is this coffee for you or for Mister Kaspbrak?”

“Mister Kaspbrak,” he repeated, sounding it out. “God, he’s a dick to everyone here, isn’t he?”

“Uh,” Laney said. “I like him?”

“Are you sure?” Rich Tozier said and laughed. 

“I do!” She said and felt flustered. “He gave me and my wife a very generous gift when we got married even though he didn’t come to the wedding.”

“He’s got a thing about weddings.” She lifted a brow at him but decided not to push. “The coffee’s for him, but I won’t say no to one if there’s a mug in this circle of Hell.”

She snorted in a lame attempt to hold back a laugh. “You can use mine,” she said. “He likes dark roast, but we have pods for some hazelnut flavoured thing and also decaf.”

“I’m surprised this place doesn’t have some fancy hand-pressed espresso thing.”

“There’s one on the other floor,” Laney said, “but it’s fucking gross. Everyone who works here is a freak.”

That made Rich Tozier laugh, which gave Laney an insane ego boost. Should she try to write a tight five? 

“Eddie said as much.” She put her mug under the Keurig and loaded the first pod into the machine. “Those things are so bad for the environment,” he said. 

“This is basically Wall Street,” she said. “At least 90 percent of the people here have no moral compass whatsoever.”

He snorted. “Eddie said that too.”

The coffee started to spit into the mug. She turned to him. “So,” she said, crossing her arms across her chest. 

“Uh oh,” he said. “I’m in for it now.”

She shook her head, smiled. “Not at all. I just - I wasn’t here when you came in. People are going crazy with gossip today. Are you friends with him?”

“Yeah,” Rich Tozier said. “I guess.”

“You guess?” 

“We are,” he said. “I don’t, uh. I don’t want to overstep. He seems...like he wants to be a man of mystery here.”

“Uh, yeah, he’s pretty tight-lipped,” she said. “He’s the smartest person here.”

“He’s dumb as shit,” Rich Tozier said, but he was laughing. “Look - he likes you. He doesn’t like anyone. He hardly likes me and I’ve known him since he was five years old. So I think I can tell you this: he’s clearly good at his job, there’s no way he got that swanky office by phoning it in. But he is dumb as rocks.”

“Does he really go by Eddie?” Laney asked. It felt like precious information. She had never heard anyone call him anything other than Mister Kaspbrak. 

“His entire life.” The coffee finished, and she put the mug on the counter. Held her hand out for Rich Tozier to pass over Kaspbrak’s mug. Set up the new pod, and hit brew. 

“He takes oat milk in his,” Laney said, “but we have half and half and probably soy or something in the fridge.”

“I can do oat milk,” he said. 

“Is he doing okay?” Laney asked, hoping to find out something she actually cared about. She didn’t care if his wife had hit him with a car or if he’d been stabbed in the face, at least no insofar as learning the dirty deets of the gossip, but rather just that he was okay. She wanted to learn from him; it was a normal thing to care about the wellbeing of the people around you, the people you saw every day. She didn’t need the nitty-gritty details of his clearly difficult time off - she just wanted to know he was getting through it. 

“He’s doing better, I think.”

“He was listening to Death Cab earlier. Are you sure?”

That made Rich Tozier laugh - she really didn’t think she was that funny; it was possible he was just easy. “That was my fault. I made him a playlist.”

“Think he’d send it to me?”

“I can make him.” Laney got the oat milk out as the second cup of coffee finished. “But, uh, I think he is doing okay. He’s pretty tough.”

“Never doubted that,” Laney said, and that made Rich Tozier’s face do something complicated. “Don’t tell him I asked, okay? I don’t want him to think it’s obvious.”

“I won’t.”

“I’m trusting you,” she said. “I’m a big fan.”

“Of mine?” He asked, sounding surprised.

“No, I had to Google who you were when I heard you were here. Of Mister Kaspbrak. I’m glad he has friends who come to visit him. That’s nice.” 

“I think he's a fan of you too,” he said. “He wouldn’t tell me to find you if he wasn’t.”

“People are going to ask me what the hell is going on, you realize. Troy from accounting has been staring at us from over his computer like you’re from Mars.”

“Is Troy from accounting a cool guy who is just a little star-struck?”

“No, he sucks,” Laney said, and Rich Tozier looked around until his eyes landed on him.

“That guy?” He asked, without nodding or gesturing in any way. “Blue shirt?”

“Blue shirt,” Laney said, and Rich Tozier flipped him the bird as they left the kitchenette. 

  
  
  


At ten minutes after five, Laney gathered up her stuff. Most of the office left between four and five, so it was relatively calm in the office now. She went to wash her mug but realized she didn’t have it. Had to lean back in her chair to see into Kaspbrak’s office. The door was closed, but he didn't look like he was on the phone. She could knock. 

She threw her coat over her arm and stuffed her phone and AirPods into her tote bag before crossing the room in a series of zigzags to get to Kaspbrak’s office door. 

She knocked softly on the door, he waved her in without looking up from his computer screen. 

“Hi, Mister Kaspbrak, sorry to bother you,” Laney said, leaning on the doorframe. “I just wanted to come grab my mug.”

“Elaine,” he said, and looked away from whatever he was working on. He gave her a polite smile. “I totally forgot to bring it back to you. Sorry.”

“No need to apologize,” she said. “It’s no biggie.”

He leaned back in his chair. “Richie said you were a big help.”

“It’s just coffee,” she said. 

“It’s not,” he said, like he meant it. “How have you been?”

“Oh,” she said. “Uh, good, I guess. Keeping busy.”

“How’s your wife?” He asked. “I’m sorry, I can’t remember her name.”

“Jack,” she said. “Uh, Jacklyn. She’s good. Working late today, but generally, we’re all a-ok.”

“I’m glad.” He said. “Does she work late often?”

“She manages a bar,” Laney said. Were they making small talk? Edward Kaspbrak, MAS, MEcon, was making small talk with her? “So sometimes, yeah.”

“If it’s not weird, maybe we could get a drink after work or something, the next time she’s working late? Richie said I should ask.”

“Oh,” she said again. “Uh, sure, if you want to?”

“You’re the only person who works here who knows anything about anything,” he said. “He said it’s important for me to have friends who understand what I’m talking about when I complain about idiots.”

“Well, we work with a number of idiots,” she said, and she gave a small laugh. “I hope it’s not, uh, strange to say. I’m glad you’re back, sir.”

“Oh, don’t call me sir. If we go to happy hour, you can at least call me Eddie.”

“It’ll take getting used to,” she said. “But then you have to stop calling me Elaine.”

“Deal,” he said. 

“Cool.” Then, she said, “So, uh, Mister Kaspbr - I mean, Eddie. I gotta tell you, man. Everyone thinks you got fucking stabbed.”

He laughed then, and said, “I did.”

She felt her eyebrows shoot up. “Your wife stabbed you?”

He shook his head. “We’re separated, now, but no. No. A serial killer I went to middle school with did.”

“What,” she said for a lack of anything better.

“Feed that into the rumour mill,” he said and smiled. “I can wash your mug for you. I’ll leave it on your desk before I go.”

“Okay,” she said, shell shocked. “I expect more details on that story when we’re two highballs deep.”

“You got it,” he said, and she knew she was being dismissed. “Have a good evening, Laney.”

“Goodnight, Eddie,” she said and closed his office door after her. 

In the elevator, she texted Jack. 

_Kaspbrak invited me to get happy hour drinks with him sometime_ _  
_ _He said i should call him eddie what does that mean_

_I knew you’d go straight for that 40 yo bootlicker one day babe_

_THIS IS A BIG DEAL TO ME NOT EVERYTHING IS A JOKE_

_Speaking of not-jokes, some comedian came out on Twitter today.  
He posted a pic of a mug with little rainbows all over it.  
I think you have the same one, lol! Let me send a link. _

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> you may notice i made this a series!!! you may notice!! 
> 
> i'm on twitter @ decinq_
> 
> EDIT: this fic series now has an accompanying TWITTER AU HERE: [ @longlistau](https://twitter.com/longlistau/status/1350137596949610496?s=21)


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